[Contains Italian subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
Adi Da critica il cultismo in genere e in particolare quello religioso. Questo discorso, che risale al 1978, č uno dei ricorsi sullo stesso tema che si sono susseguiti negli anni.
Adi Da criticized religious cultism, long before the subject gained any popular attention. (For an audio clip of His earliest criticisms — in June, 1972 — click here.) This discourse, "Cos'č il Cultismo?" ("What Is Cultism?"), given in 1978 at The Mountain Of Attention, is one of His summary addresses on the subject. Adi Da observes that the primary characteristic of a cult member is shared enthusiasm (like enjoying the energy of the crowd at a football game). For example, in "the cult of the Spiritual Master", everybody is enjoying the enthusiasm (their own and each other's) associated with having "found" the great Master; but no one is actually engaged in significant deepening of the devotional and spiritual relationship with the Master, and practicing on that basis — hence no Spiritual growth or Realization occurs.
Adi Da: "My purpose in My Teaching is to make it possible for you to duplicate what I have done — not to be eternally separated from Me, but to be in Communion with Me — to be intimate with Me in Spiritual terms, so that you, yourself, may live this practice, and fulfill it in your own case."
[Contains Polish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
W tym humorystycznym i głęboko wnikliwym dyskursie Adi Da rozważa różnicę między samoświadomością a egotyzmem, odnosząc się zarówno do ludzi, jak i do nie-ludzi (w tym psów, mrówek i drzew).
"Czy mrówka to też ego?" ("Is an ant an ego?") is a video excerpt from a humorous and profoundly insightful Avataric Discourse (given by Adi Da on October 20, 2004 at Adi Da Samrajashram), Adi Da considers the difference between self-consciousness and egoity, referring to both humans and non-humans (including dogs, ants, and trees).
ADI DA: Na ogół egotyzm przypisujesz ludziom, ale zastanawiasz się nad wszystkim innym.
Na przykład, jak to jest nie tylko z czymś tak biernym jak dywan, czy choćby czymś co stoi i wydaje się, że nie ma zdolności szybkiego reagowania, jak drzewo.
Ale na przykład pies? Czy kiedy patrzysz na psa myślisz, że to ego równie szybko, jak o ludziach myślisz że są ego? I dlaczego wyznaczasz granicę? Kiedy przestajesz myśleć o żyjących istotach jako ego? Czy po prostu zakładasz, że wszystko co jest większe od świerszcza to ego? Albo, że wszystko co się rusza z perspektywy twoich doświadczeń, albo tego, co uważasz za naturalne założenie?
Jak daleko sięga sprawa egotyzmu w twoim przekonaniu?
Tak. „Ego” jest greckim słowem i oznacz "ja". Rozważam to z tobą i mówię o tym w znaczeniu samoograniczenia, a więc jest to rozszerzenie jego znaczenia. Ale słowo to znaczy po prostu "ja", co oznacza samo odniesienie, tak zwany zaimek zwrotny, autoreferencyjny. A zatem, czy mrówka jest do tego zdolna?
Widzisz, że się bronią i szamoczą z innymi. Nie mogłyby tego robić bez pewnego rodzaju samoświadomości.
A zatem zakładasz, że nawet coś takiego jak mrówka jest ego, świadoma siebie. Czy to coś musi się przemieszczać ze swojego miejsca? Czy musi być zdolne do pójścia na spacer, tak jak mrówka czy człowiek, czy może to być drzewo?
Czy drzewo jest siebie świadome? Już z racji definicji samoświadomość jest rodzajem egotyzmu A jak to jest z drzewami? Widoczna jest u nich pewnego rodzaju samo-świadomość. W tym sensie też są ego. Ale czy są egotyczne?
Czy funkcjonują egotycznie? Drzewa, ogólnie mówiąc, tak się nie zachowują.
Posiadają samo-świadomość jako organizmy, ale wydaje się, że nie są szczególnie zaniepokojone tym, że są drzewami. Charakteryzuje je raczej pewnego rodzaju kontemplacja, w której nie odczuwają niepokoju. To samo można czasem zauważyć obserwując różne istoty poza ludźmi. Jeżeli zaobserwujesz nie-ludzi, praktycznie u wszystkich widoczne są oznaki lokowania się w zacisznym miejscu by oddać się kontemplacjom, które przypominają rodzaj samadhi albo stany medytacji.
Jak myślisz dlaczego ludzie są niezrównoważeni? Dlaczego ludzki egotyz jest tym czy jest? Jeżeli zaobserwujesz jak się objawia u nie-ludzi, sugeruje to, że ludzie są takimi jakimi są, bo czują się zamknięci. I nie tylko zamknięcia za ścianami i kratami. Niektórzy są za kratami i stają się bardzo niespokojni, chodzą tam i z powrotem stają się katatoniczni.
Zniewolenie jest twoim własnym aktem, podyktowanym również przez uwarunkowania.
Warunki mogą wzmocnić, a nawet, usprawiedliwić samo-ograniczenie. Ale ciągle tym powodem z którego cierpisz jest samo-ograniczenie.
Nie mniej jednak, jest coś co można zauważyć u ludzi o pewnej dojrzałości duchowej.
Następuje u nich rozluźnienie tendencji do samo-ograniczenia. Nie żyją oni w poczuciu zniewolenia tak dalece jak to robi przeciętny człowiek. A zatem ludzie są dosłownie zniewoleni, samo-zniewoleni,i żyją, odczuwając w różnym stopniu, ograniczenia warunkami życia. I w efekcie ludzie czują, że egzystencja w ciele fizycznym jest ograniczeniem. Bo niezależnie od tego jak zdrowo teraz się czujesz, wiesz że umrzesz, i potencjalnie może cię spotkać wiele przykrości.
Zdajesz sobie sprawę, że to nieuniknione i wcześniej czy później, doświadczysz oczywistych trudności których wolałabyś uniknąć łącznie z chorobą i śmiercią. Wszystko co żyje życiem fizycznym umrze. Różnica polega na tym, czy doprowadza cię to do szału, prawia, że poszukujesz, albo czy jesteś spokojna, bo nie utraciłaś kontaktu z Tym co transcenduje taką możliwość?
ADI DA: [Laughs] You generally attribute egoity to human beings, but you wonder about everything else. For instance, what about not something relatively inert like a rug or even just standing there and not seeming to be particularly responsive, like a tree. But what about a dog? Is a dog, do you think dogs are egos when you see them, just as readily as you think of human beings as egos? But, why do you draw the line? I mean how far does it go? Where do you stop thinking of living entities, at least, as egos? Do you just presume everything bigger than a cricket is an ego? Or is everything that moves in your, from your perspective experientially or in your natural presumptions, how far do, does the fact of egoity extend in your presumption.
Well, is an ant an ego in your presumption?
The word “ego” is actually a Greek word which means “I”. I consider it with you and talk about it in terms of self-contraction and so forth, but, so that’s the elaboration on its meaning, but the word simply means “I” which means the reference, self-reference, the reflexive, reflexive pronoun as it’s called of self-reference. So, does an ant feel self-referential?
You observe them protecting themselves and struggling with others. Couldn’t do so without some kind of self-consciousness, could it? So, you naturally presume that even something like an ant is, is a self, an ego, self-aware. Does something have to move from its spatial location? Does it have to be able to take a walk or, such as an ant or a human being, or can a tree? Does a tree have self-consciousness, exhibit self-consciousness. . .
What about trees? They are entities with apparent self-consciousness of a kind. They are in that sense, egos. But are they egoic? Are they functioning egoically? Are they feeling that they are in bondage and moved to seek as human beings are and as you feel in your own case, you see? Trees don’t seem to behave, generally speaking, in quite that way. They are self-conscious as organisms, but they don’t seem to be particularly disturbed about being trees. They seem more characterized by some kind of contemplation in which they don’t feel disturbed.
But if you observe non-humans, virtually all of them show signs of setting themselves apart and entering into a contemplative state that resembles some kind of a samadhi or meditative condition.
Why do you think human beings are disturbed? You see, why is human egoity what it is? If you observe how it appears in evidence in non-humans, suggests that human beings are the way they are because they’re confined, and not just confined by walls and bars. Some people are, and they get very disturbed there, and walk back and forth or get catatonic.
Your bondage is your own activity, and it also extends from conditions. Conditions can reinforce or seem to justify self-contraction. But still what you’re suffering is self-contraction itself.
So, human beings are actually confined, and they are self-confined, and otherwise, also, living in various modes and degrees of confinement by conditions of life and in fact, human beings feel confined by bodily existence, because however healthy you may be at the moment, you know you’re going to die, and are potentially, potentially, you could suffer any number of great happenings. And you anticipate that inevitably, you will, sooner or later, experience some fundamental difficulties that you would prefer not to have to endure, including disease and death.
Well, everything that’s physically living is going to die. The trouble, the difference is does it drive you crazy, make you seek, or are you at ease, because you haven’t lost touch with what transcends that possibility?
Czym jest kult? poster: Adi Da Video Polska length: 19:00 date added: June 2, 2017 event date: December 16, 1978 language: Polish views: 3411; views this month: 10; views this week: 4
[Contains Polish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
Adi Da krytyka kultu religijnego. Dyskurs ten, wydany w 1978 roku, jest jednym z jego podsumowań na ten temat.
Aby uzyskać więcej informacji o Adi Da Samraj i Drodze Serca proszę pisać na adres: adidavideo.pl@gmail.com.
Adi Da criticized religious cultism, long before the subject gained any popular attention. (For an audio clip of His earliest criticisms — in June, 1972 — click here.) This discourse, given in 1978 at The Mountain Of Attention, is one of His summary addresses on the subject. Adi Da observes that the primary characteristic of a cult member is shared enthusiasm (like enjoying the energy of the crowd at a football game). For example, in "the cult of the Spiritual Master", everybody is enjoying the enthusiasm (their own and each other's) associated with having "found" the great Master; but no one is actually engaged in significant deepening of the devotional and spiritual relationship with the Master, and practicing on that basis — hence no Spiritual growth or Realization occurs.
Adi Da: "My purpose in My Teaching is to make it possible for you to duplicate what I have done — not to be eternally separated from Me, but to be in Communion with Me — to be intimate with Me in Spiritual terms, so that you, yourself, may live this practice, and fulfill it in your own case."
Da Hridayam poster: DawnHorsePress length: 05:54 date added: November 15, 2017 language: English listens: 3052; listens this month: 24; listens this week: 7
This audio excerpt is "Da Om, Om Da" — track 5 on the CD, Da Hridayam.
Da Hridayam is a collection of devotional chants from longtime devotee, JoAnne Sunshine. These new chants invoke the Divine via the Names and Declarations of Divine Realizer Avatar Adi Da Samraj. The CD beautifully explores a vast array of cultural styles and instruments. It is uplifting, absorbing, and inventive — a sublime celebration.
"True Water—cool, clear, and surprising." —Ray Lynch, composer and 3-time Billboard Award winner
JoAnne Sunshine has devoted many years to studying and practicing the art of sacred devotional singing in the company of Avatar Adi Da Samraj. JoAnne has written compositions for Broadway star Laura Theodore, opera singers Crane Kirkbride, Mel McMurrin, and Elizabeth deBrine. Crane Kirkbride commissioned the song “I Am Who You Are”, which was first produced by Ray Lynch and subsequently by John Mackay. She recorded and sang “I Am With You Now” with Ray Lynch, a devotional song familiar to many devotees.
[Contains German subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
This is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness" (German: "Der körperliche Sitz des Glücklichseins"), which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on CD.
The talk communicates several core insights:
1. Everybody is intuitively familiar with happiness. You don't have to be a devotee of Adi Da! This was part of the reason Adi Da chose "happiness" as the focus of this Teaching period: because the subject was so accessible. Everyone knows what it's like to be happy (at least a little). It's just that most people are not aware that Perfect, Eternal Happiness is possible and Realizable. (And it certainly isn't, through ordinary human means.) Adi Da: "All beings are always already Happy. You always know, at this very moment you know exactly, what it would be to look and feel and be and act completely Happy." The esoteric reason everyone is familiar with happiness is because everyone is always, already happy. And the esoteric reason everyone yearns for complete happiness is because complete happiness is realizable — and everyone's heart knows that.
2. Adi Da's "Lesson of Life":"You can't become happy; you can only be (already) happy." People are always seeking for happiness. The "pursuit of happiness" (not happiness itself!) is even enshrined as an "unalienable right" (alongside life and liberty) in the preamble of the United States Declaration of Independence. Its author, Thomas Jefferson, knew better than to think a government could guarantee happiness itself — hence only the guarantee of "the pursuit of happiness". Only a Divine Incarnation can guarantee Happiness Itself.
Adi Da reveals that happiness is the native state of beings. It is already the case. Every attempt to seek for it (mis-identifying the source of happiness as some object or other) in fact serves to dissociate one from it. Adi Da: "You think that you can seek Happiness and find it. Your search for Happiness is itself a confession of un-Happiness. You cannot realize Happiness by persisting in un-Happiness, persisting in the method of un-Happiness. All seeking is an expression of un-Happiness, all seeking is the method of un-Happiness, the practice of un-Happiness. This must be understood. It is not merely true — it must be understood."
Self-understanding allows one to get this point. Based on self-understanding, one can devote oneself to Happiness rather than to seeking for It and settling for the little bit of Infinite Happiness that "bleeds through" the clench of ego into conditions. This ultimately enables the Eternal Realization of Infinite, Perfect Happiness. Adi Da: "Understand your un-Happiness. Then you will be capable of locating Happiness, and, having located Happiness, you will be capable of practicing the Way of Adidam, which is nothing but the devotion of life to Happiness."
3. The Transmission of the Divine Guru is How One Locates Happiness. The subtitle of the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness, is: "On the Incarnation of the Divine Person and the Transmission of Love-Bliss". In other words, you can't apply "The Lesson of Life" by somehow "locating" happiness directly, by yourself (or in yourself). Happiness is our native state, but that doesn't mean it can be located by an egoic, "do it yourself" process. We locate happiness directly as a Grace-given Gift, through devotion to the Transcendental Spiritual Transmission of Adi Da. Adi Da: "Happiness is presently the case. In this moment you are already Happy. Sitting with Me, locate this Happiness." We locate our "Native State" by recognizing and submitting to our "Native Person" — our Very Self appearing here in bodily (human) form.
4. It is a Process of Whole Bodily Location. "The bodily location of Happiness" is not primarily a reference to some place where Happiness resides in the body (although Adi Da teases His listeners with this idea: "Look for it in your toes, in your fingers, in your shirt, in your head"). It refers to a process ("the bodily location of Happiness" = "the locating of Happiness with the whole body-mind") that involves the surrender and transformation of every aspect of the body-mind, immersed in the Perfectly Happy State of the Divine Guru, through recognition of Him as the Divine in every moment. Then the secondary and supportive practices of the Way of Adidam become means for staying immersed in that Divine State in every moment: "Having located Happiness [having recognized Adi Da as the Divine], you will be capable of practicing the Way of Adidam, which is nothing but the devotion of life to Happiness [Adi Da, recognized as the Divine]. The practices of this Way are not methods for attaining Happiness, but they are the expressions of Happiness. The disciplines of money, food, and sex are not a way to become Happy. Discipline is difficult enough — why should we also burden it with the obligation to make us Happy!"
Divine Distraction with James Steinberg poster: AdiDaUpClose speaker: James Steinberg length: 50:54 date added: February 1, 2016 language: English listens: 6213; listens this month: 13; listens this week: 5
James Steinberg is interviewed on the podcast, Vajra Body Vajra Mind. Vajra Body Vajra Mind is a provocative podcast that explores the outer limits of spiritual practice and human development. James Steinberg is a longtime devotee of Adi Da, and the author of Divine Distraction and Love of the God-Man.
In this episode of Vajra Body Vajra Mind, we discuss James' life with Adi Da. We talk about the practice of Guru Yoga, challenges in reading Adi Da's Teaching, anti-Guru sentiment in contemporary culture, sexuality in spirituality, the importance of discipline in the Way of Adidam, the unique Transmission of Adi Da's Revelation and Presence (through photographs, videos, Image-Art, etc), resistance to the Guru by the ego, positive disillusionment (aka "the Lesson of Life"), and more.
poster: realityway speaker: Max Rykov length: 07:42 date added: September 30, 2009 language: English views: 3909; views this month: 4; views this week: 1
In the second part of this three-part series, 20 year-old Max Rykov continues to describe the process he went through before becoming a formal devotee of Avatar Adi Da Samraj, including some of the difficulties he initially came up against.
[Contains Polish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
Oto fragment rozmowy Adi Da, "Gdzie w ciele jest szczęście?", którą wygłosił 28 listopada 1981 roku. Poniżej publikujemy fragment tekstu z tego nagrania.
"Duchowy Proces w trudnych czasach" ("The Spiritual Process in Troubled Times") is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on DVD and on CD, and as an online transcript.
ADI DA: Życie jest głupotą, ale to nie są czasy na tolerowanie głupoty. Świat jest szalony, to straszne czasy, a w nadchodzących latach wcale nie będzie łatwiej. Proces duchowy zawsze przeżywano w trudnych czasach. Dlatego proces duchowy nie toleruje głupca. Sam Proces Duchowy pokona cię. Nie jest to łatwe osiągnięcie, to nieprawdopodobnie trudna sprawa. Nawet to, czego dzisiaj słuchaliście, zostało wysłuchane tylko przez ułamek rodzaju ludzkiego w całej jego historii. Możliwość praktyki jest niezwykle rzadka, a spełnienie jej jest praktycznie nieznane.
W pewnym sensie można powiedzieć, że to życie jest piekłem. W naszym języku religijnym mówimy o tym, co może się z tobą stać po śmierci. Cóż, można iść do nieba, można iść do czyśćca żeby się oczyścić lub można iść do piekła. A potem być może udasz się do czyśćca czy tymczasowego piekła, i może będziesz miał szczęście urodzić się jako istota ludzka i poświęcić się duchowemu procesowi. Natura tego piekła polega na tym, że jesteśmy opętani sami sobą. Rodzimy się w nie-Szczęściu i nie przekraczamy go łatwo. Nieustannie dążymy do szczęścia poprzez wszelkiego rodzaju niezwykle złożone środki i nigdy go nie osiągamy.
Gdyby Urzeczywistnieni Adepci nie wracali by nauczać, to tutaj byłoby naprawdę piekło, a nie coś podobnego do piekła. Gdyby nie było możliwości Oświecenia, gdyby nie był Nauk, nie było Boskiego Prawa, Adeptów, Świętej Drogi, Świętej wspólnoty, ani możliwości samo-transcendencji, to tutaj byłoby naprawdę piekło.
ADI DA: Life is foolishness. This is no time, in any case, to be tolerant of foolishness. The world is mad, and these are dreadful times. Things are not going to be easier in the years ahead. The spiritual process has always been lived in difficult times. Therefore, the spiritual process tolerates no fool. The spiritual process itself will spit you out. It is not an easy attainment, but a profoundly difficult affair. Even what you have listened to today has been heard by only a fraction of the human race in all of history. The opportunity to practice is extremely rare, and the fulfillment of practice is practically unknown.
In some sense you could say this life is hell. . . The nature of this hell is that we are self-possessed. We are born in un-Happiness and we do not transcend it readily. We constantly pursue Happiness through all kinds of incredibly complex means, and we never attain It. . .
If Spiritual Realizers did not turn about and Teach, this would truly be a hell instead of being like a hell. It would truly be a hell if there were no possibility of Enlightenment, if there were no Teaching, no Spiritual Masters, no sacred Way, no sacred community, no capacity for understanding or self-transcendence.
[Contains Spanish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
This is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on DVD and on CD, and as an online transcript.
ADI DA: Life is foolishness. This is no time, in any case, to be tolerant of foolishness. The world is mad, and these are dreadful times. Things are not going to be easier in the years ahead. The spiritual process has always been lived in difficult times. Therefore, the spiritual process tolerates no fool. The spiritual process itself will spit you out. It is not an easy attainment, but a profoundly difficult affair. Even what you have listened to today has been heard by only a fraction of the human race in all of history. The opportunity to practice is extremely rare, and the fulfillment of practice is practically unknown.
In some sense you could say this life is hell. . . The nature of this hell is that we are self-possessed. We are born in un-Happiness and we do not transcend it readily. We constantly pursue Happiness through all kinds of incredibly complex means, and we never attain It. . .
If Spiritual Realizers did not turn about and Teach, this would truly be a hell instead of being like a hell. It would truly be a hell if there were no possibility of Enlightenment, if there were no Teaching, no Spiritual Masters, no sacred Way, no sacred community, no capacity for understanding or self-transcendence.
Endorsement for Not-Two Is Peace poster: swaybone11 speaker: Theo Cedar Jones length: 01:59 date added: February 1, 2012 language: English views: 3534; views this month: 6; views this week: 1
A commercial (from Theo Cedar Jones) for Adi Da's book, Not-Two Is Peace, which describes how the human race can save itself by adopting a new form of global cooperative culture based on "prior unity".
poster: frank marrero length: 10:03 date added: July 9, 2012 event date: 1996 language: English views: 2249; views this month: 5; views this week: 1
At The Mountain Of Attention, Adi Da Samraj addresses a question about the difficulty a devotee is experiencing in his practice. Adi Da points out the Western aversion to being rightly mastered and living by His instruction and how this turns the practice into a "problem".
Freedom Is The Only Law poster: AdiDaVideos length: 04:13 date added: January 17, 2020 language: English views: 1163; views this month: 8; views this week: 2
The audio recording is an excerpt from a recitation of Adi Da's essay, "Freedom Is The Only Law and Happiness Is The Only Reality". This is the Epilogue from Adi Da's book, The Truly Human New World-Culture of Unbroken Real-God-Man, which was originally written in 2001, and updated on November 13, 2019. The essay is read by a student of Adi Da. In the secular world, words like "freedom" and " love" are given a very limited definition. In this essay, Adi Da expands the true meaning of both of these words.
ADI DA: I Am here to Divinely Liberate all beings.
I Am here to Grant True Freedom to every one.
“Freedom” is one of the principal words associated with the politics of this “late-time”. The general trend toward the democratization of the entire world carries with it an intensified interest in the concept of freedom and in the pursuit of freedom. However, in the context and circumstance of this “late-time”, the word “freedom” is used in such a way that the true import of the word is lost, and its meaning is transformed, and even vulgarized.
The same process of vulgarization has also occurred in the case of other words, such as (for example) the word “love”. The word “love” represents a profound concept and reality, but the word itself tends to be used very casually. People commonly say that they “love” this or that, meaning something quite different from what the word “love” rightly and truly signifies.
“Love” is a word that rightly refers to the universal Sacrifice of ego-“self”. Real love is a matter of transcending “self” (or going beyond your limitations in relation to others)—but, in the “late-time” circumstance of vulgarized culture, the word “love” has come to be used in relation to whatever satisfies your inclinations, or fulfills your desires, or (otherwise) somehow compensates for limitations in your life by pleasing you and (thereby) supporting your egoic disposition. None of that has anything to do with real love.
So it also is with the word “freedom”, and the notion of freedom. The world-culture of this “late-time” is essentially an ego-culture associated with complications in the first three stages of life. It is essentially an adolescent culture. And it is in the context of that culture that great words like “love” and “freedom” become vulgarized. In the adolescent disposition, the word “freedom”, like the word “love”, is reduced to an egoic meaning. People say they want to be “free”, or want to act “freely”, or want to be “free” to do this or that—but what they actually mean is that they want to be able to fulfill their desires without limitation. An adolescent reacting to parental authority or parental expectations regards any such authority or expectations to be oppressive or limiting. Therefore, such adolescents say that they want to be “free” to do whatever they please. And that is, in general, what is meant in this “late-time” by the word “freedom”. Even in the larger political sphere, the word “freedom” is used to express the (personal, and also collective) intent to be able to fulfill desires—and those desires are (necessarily) fundamentally ego-based.
What does the fulfillment of desires have to do with true freedom? Rightly, the word “freedom” is synonymous with the word “liberation”. To “be free”, or to “be liberated”, means to “go beyond bondage”. The opposite of “freedom” is “bondage”. If one is truly moved to be truly free, one is moved to relinquish (and go beyond) bondage. Such is the true Wisdom-understanding of freedom.
Neither true freedom, nor real love, nor any other great concept is rightly understood via the words and concepts of adolescents. There must be human maturity (and, therefore, growth in Wisdom) for the great meanings underlying these concepts to be understood and actually lived.
Be moved toward real love, without limit. Be moved toward real happiness, without limit.
Be moved toward true freedom, without limit. You should (and, ultimately, must) be so moved. But to actually realize love (or real happiness, or true freedom) without limit, you must deal with yourself most profoundly. You cannot merely be reactive, like an adolescent or a worldly person.
If you want to be truly free, you must first understand that you are bound, and you must understand how you are bound, and then you must do something about that. If, on the other hand, you are merely reactively inclined to fulfill desires, and you want to be (so-called) “free” to do so, then you are not examining your bondage—what its roots are, what its signs are, what its characteristics are—and, if you are not examining your bondage with real discriminative intelligence, you are also not doing what you must do in order to be truly free.
[Contains Polish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
Klasyczny dyskurs Awatara Adi Da z 1981 r. Adi Da rozważa naturę prawdziwego szczęścia i tego, jak nie szukając szczęścia można je realizować w każdej chwili.
"Gdzie umiejscowione jest szczęście?" ("Where is happiness located?") is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on CD.
The talk communicates several core insights:
1. Everybody is intuitively familiar with happiness. You don't have to be a devotee of Adi Da! This was part of the reason Adi Da chose "happiness" as the focus of this Teaching period: because the subject was so accessible. Everyone knows what it's like to be happy (at least a little). It's just that most people are not aware that Perfect, Eternal Happiness is possible and Realizable. (And it certainly isn't, through ordinary human means.) Adi Da: "All beings are always already Happy. You always know, at this very moment you know exactly, what it would be to look and feel and be and act completely Happy." The esoteric reason everyone is familiar with happiness is because everyone is always, already happy. And the esoteric reason everyone yearns for complete happiness is because complete happiness is realizable — and everyone's heart knows that.
2. Adi Da's "Lesson of Life":"You can't become happy; you can only be (already) happy." People are always seeking for happiness. The "pursuit of happiness" (not happiness itself!) is even enshrined as an "unalienable right" (alongside life and liberty) in the preamble of the United States Declaration of Independence. Its author, Thomas Jefferson, knew better than to think a government could guarantee happiness itself — hence only the guarantee of "the pursuit of happiness". Only a Divine Incarnation can guarantee Happiness Itself.
Adi Da reveals that happiness is the native state of beings. It is already the case. Every attempt to seek for it (mis-identifying the source of happiness as some object or other) in fact serves to dissociate one from it. Adi Da: "You think that you can seek Happiness and find it. Your search for Happiness is itself a confession of un-Happiness. You cannot realize Happiness by persisting in un-Happiness, persisting in the method of un-Happiness. All seeking is an expression of un-Happiness, all seeking is the method of un-Happiness, the practice of un-Happiness. This must be understood. It is not merely true — it must be understood."
Self-understanding allows one to get this point. Based on self-understanding, one can devote oneself to Happiness rather than to seeking for It and settling for the little bit of Infinite Happiness that "bleeds through" the clench of ego into conditions. This ultimately enables the Eternal Realization of Infinite, Perfect Happiness. Adi Da: "Understand your un-Happiness. Then you will be capable of locating Happiness, and, having located Happiness, you will be capable of practicing the Way of Adidam, which is nothing but the devotion of life to Happiness."
3. The Transmission of the Divine Guru is How One Locates Happiness. The subtitle of the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness, is: "On the Incarnation of the Divine Person and the Transmission of Love-Bliss". In other words, you can't apply "The Lesson of Life" by somehow "locating" happiness directly, by yourself (or in yourself). Happiness is our native state, but that doesn't mean it can be located by an egoic, "do it yourself" process. We locate happiness directly as a Grace-given Gift, through devotion to the Transcendental Spiritual Transmission of Adi Da. Adi Da: "Happiness is presently the case. In this moment you are already Happy. Sitting with Me, locate this Happiness." We locate our "Native State" by recognizing and submitting to our "Native Person" — our Very Self appearing here in bodily (human) form.
4. It is a Process of Whole Bodily Location. "The bodily location of Happiness" is not primarily a reference to some place where Happiness resides in the body (although Adi Da teases His listeners with this idea: "Look for it in your toes, in your fingers, in your shirt, in your head"). It refers to a process ("the bodily location of Happiness" = "the locating of Happiness with the whole body-mind") that involves the surrender and transformation of every aspect of the body-mind, immersed in the Perfectly Happy State of the Divine Guru, through recognition of Him as the Divine in every moment. Then the secondary and supportive practices of the Way of Adidam become means for staying immersed in that Divine State in every moment: "Having located Happiness [having recognized Adi Da as the Divine], you will be capable of practicing the Way of Adidam, which is nothing but the devotion of life to Happiness [Adi Da, recognized as the Divine]. The practices of this Way are not methods for attaining Happiness, but they are the expressions of Happiness. The disciplines of money, food, and sex are not a way to become Happy. Discipline is difficult enough — why should we also burden it with the obligation to make us Happy!"
poster: AdiDaUpClose speaker: Steve Alexander length: 13:17 date added: July 8, 2012 language: English views: 4365; views this month: 4; views this week: 1
Steve Alexander describes his experiences of Huichol shamanism (while in his twenties), and his aspiration to become a shaman. Then, while on a Huichol pilgrimage in Mexico, "everything that could possible go wrong, did". For a "suburban kid from Los Angeles" it was like "trying to put on someone else's shoe".
Steve returned to focus on his university education in fine art. All the while, an awareness of a Divine Presence in his heart was growing. He describes how he cultivated his relationship with that Presence, even as he became increasingly aware of his own egoity and the ways it would tend to shut down that Presence.
Steve describes how his formal relinquishment of Huichol shamanism opened the door to the intensification of that Presence, and ultimately, to his devotional relationship with the human form of that Presence: Adi Da.
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